Abandoned warehouses were becoming artist lofts. The old dry dock was now a park and an IKEA. There were markets, museums, wineries, bars… Gentrification had found Red Hook. Tempest wondered if it had anything to do with the quieted crime in the area. Sanctuary was very close and its activities – involvement in the community, a new image, open safety for all – certainly had had an impact. Of course, Devon had stopped a few criminals here.

So had Spasm.

So had Calcifer.

Tempest sighed, his breath visible in the cool night air. He gazed down upon the pier from hundreds of feet above, the winds encircling and holding their son as he hovered in wonder. Late summer often saw fog: warm land, cool night air, humidity. Tempest pushed it far beyond what had been expected. It crept out from the water and stretched over the neighborhood.

The nefarious group of low-lives who’d come together in a facsimile of organized crime were using a few of the warehouses below for transporting something in and out of the city. Guns, drugs, who knows… This wasn’t one of their business fronts or pressured resident. All intel pointed here and thus Devon had started to refer to them as the Red Hooks. What, had he cleaned up the streets with his allies only for this bunch to move in, pressure mutants and humans alike, all just to blame Sanctuary?

No.

Tempest tapped a hand to the side of his face mask, it as black as his eyes now. “Fogs rolling in,” he informed Ranger, the cue to begin. Tempest knew he was the best man to call in here and while Haven favored subtler tactics, sometimes other means were required. This was becoming a neighborhood and this threat had to be routed.

Through the fog he watched.

They say that nature abhors a vacuum. This was certainly true with the criminal element. In the past, Red Hook had seen its share of criminals and at times they had been pushed out by someone interested in cleaning up the area. Now the are was gentrifying, but property values had not scared away some of the criminal element who were hanging on to places they had gobbled up.

These same criminals were applying pressure against those who would see them ousted from the area completely. This meant they were working against Sanctuary and for that Devon had called on Haven to hit them back.To this end Blackforest Tactical, the security company contracted by Haven, was utilizing its Alpha team. A group of former special operators who still handled clandestine missions as contractors.

“Fogs rolling in,” Devon’s voice came over the radio and Ranger motioned to his team to advance.

Lumberjack, Bird of Prey, Sideshow, and Whirlwind. The call signs for the other members of Blac-Tac’s Alpha team. Mutants all with a mix of special forces and airborne ranger experience. Them and Ranger advanced from a small boat they had slipped into Red Hook with and moved through the fog to the warehouses. They used GPS to move through the fog. They had night vision equipment on but the fog limited everything, including Ranger’s power giving him infrared vision.

All in black the team approached the fence at the perimeter of the warehouses.Blades slid out of Lumberjack’s forearms and he cleanly sliced through the chainlink. Bird of Prey moved to take point through the hole in the fence.

”Fence line cleared. Moving to targets.”

Bird of Prey and Sideshow split off to move on the closest warehouse. Lumberjack and Whirlwind moved to the warehouse past that. Ranger hugged the fenceline and moved to handle perimeter guards. Since they were splitting into pairs they needed to control the directions tangos could come from.

”In position.” Sideshow's voice came over the radio.

”In position.” Lumberjack’s said a few moments later.

Ranger moved quietly around the perimeter. His limited infrared vision giving him better vision through the dense fog than flashlight and the naked eye. He was able to silently eliminate a couple guards while the team took their positions.

”Two EKIA. Move.”

Ranger heard nothing as the team breached both warehouses and moved inside. While they had no problem with going loud, the longer they could remain quiet the longer it was before any number of things could happen. Emergency services had a call, additional security was brought it, anyone running the show attempted to flee, whatever was being stored was destroyed, or documentation which could lead to the next target was destroyed.

Tempest listened carefully to the comms. Ranger and his team worked efficiently and quickly. They were professionals first and foremost. Devon was glad they worked with Haven, that they shared Haven’s concerns and interests. Their skills were the best you could seemingly buy, and Devon was glad the membership had their security to trust, but it was far more than that. Natalie had been somewhat snarky, but she was right: Haven’s membership needed training.

Listening and watching, Devon was assured this team would do right by them.

Ranger had already taken out two guards. Tempest wanted to avoid violence in these missions, but he knew that wouldn’t always be possible, especially when they decided to move on the warehouses here in Red Hook. This was a central point of the crime ring.

Tempest’s attention flicked to lights that flicked on in a second story window. There was someone in the office there. It was a pale glow in the fog but a distinct sign of activity to Tempest. The winds shifted slowly and Tempest drifted along, a leaf in the wind as he neared the building though he remained high above. “Building Beta. Lights on level 2, southwest corner,” he said in warning.

The two teams moved through their warehouses swiftly and efficiently. They were operating with CQC tactics to keep from having to fire their weapons. While everything had suppressors, they only make weapons hearing safe. Once you fire one, everyone knows you’re there.

Knives, tomahawks, fists, arm blades, and walls of force. These were the weapons of choice to keep quiet.

As the teams moved they called out their progress as well as a mention of movements of the enemy and when they dropped them. This allowed Ranger and Tempest to know where the teams were and what kind of opposition they were facing. It was so far only a handful or people.

Ranger continued making his way around the perimeter eliminating guards. He was approaching a guard at a gate when Tempest came over the radio. Lumberjack and Whirlwind’s building had a light on in the southwest corner of the second level.

”Roger that. Oscar Mike” Whirlwind said, indicating they were on the move to the room Tempest indicated.

A quick look toward the building, Ranger couldn’t see the room in question from his position. He moved through the fog and pulled the guard into a rear naked choke. He stashed the body in a dark corner and moved back toward the building.

”In position to breech. Three voices. Far side.”

”Breech when ready. Oscar Mike t’ y’r position.”

Ranger continued toward where his team had entered the building when he heard the sound of suppressed fire from the building, a couple unsuppressed shots, and a crack of thunder.

”Three EKIA, they know we’re here now.”

”Go loud! Stop them from destroying anythin’.” Ranger commanded as he entered building Bravo. ”Tempest, keep an eye out f’r back up.”

The warehouses hadn’t been randomly selected. There was a strong chance that valuable resources and intel could be gained from hitting these two. The longer they could go without being noticed the less time the Red Hooks had to destroy things.

The thudded shots of suppressed fire were drowned out by the sun of gun fire. True thunder cracked in the heavens as lightning spidered through the clouds. Tempest inhaled sharply as he readied violent reaction to any threats to their mission. The Red Hooks were rats now, biting and gnawing in a desperate need to get away.

There was buzzing and automotive thrumming as engines turned over in eagerness. Garage doors opened and a few scouting thugs with semi-automatic weapons waded out into the fog. Tempest dropped with an eager need, summoning the winds to carry him down and then across to collide with the three scouts. He was not gentle and the fog swirled from the motion as the men went flying. Tempest kept moving and pushed himself horizontally to change direction. Swirling breezes readied and carried him as he rocketed upward once more. The fog suffered from the movement, parting now around the nearby warehouses.

The storm was pushing back and the warm air was potent with possibility.

“Building Gamma has doors opening. Vehicles readying to move. Scouts distracted. And I see motion coming from the loading docks,” his dark eyes stared out across the night.

All hell broke loose. Gunfire erupted from the warehouses. Suppressed fire answered. And the crack of thunder occasionally boomed as Blackforest Tactical’s Alpha team engaged all possible hostiles. Ranger stormed across Bravo laying hate in support of his team there when Tempest came over the radio.

“Building Gamma has doors opening. Vehicles readying to move. Scouts distracted. And I see motion coming from the loading docks,”

”Roger that, Oscar Mike to intercept enemy Victor. ETA one Mike. Confirm bearing when they move.” Ranger replied to Tempest. His men would know what to do, no need to radio in instructions to them. Instead he retraced his path back out of the warehouse and scanned the route to Gamma. Fog still limited visibility, but he could see enough. He knew the route from aerial imagery. He hoofed it. His boots pounded pavement as he accelerated to sixty miles per hour. As when driving, don’t outrun your visibility.

He had taken too long clearing the building. The vehicle exited the garage. He’d let Tempest guide him to the vehicle and get in front of it.

The wind picked up, stirring the fog like too many ghostly rivers running from the Styx. A trio of armored SUVs screeches out of the warehouse as thunder cracked above. Through the mists black eyes spotted the incredibly quick Ranger, coming around the building as the vehicles tore through a chain link fence.

“Storm approaching,” Tempest queued in the warning as he flew down suddenly. Quick breezes and discordant gusts became a cocoon of protective air currents around Ranger as Tempest swept him up with one hand and the strength of the storm. Up they flew with violent need, pushing quickly past 110 mph. Stacked crates were flung aside, breaking open and spilling out not the canned goods they were labeled with but semi-automatic rifles.

Thunder boomed as rage bellowed in Tempest’s chest. He and Ranger rose on the diagonal, quickly reaching the fleeing vehicles and hovering some 80 feet above. Tempest exhaled slowly, supporting breezes ruffling their clothes but holding them steady for the Ranger to continue their mission.

Ranger pounded pavement. His men would cover the buildings, Tempest had called out the hostile vehicles so that was his mission. He was expecting directions, but instead Tempest swooped in like a thunder god and lifted him into the air. Tempest had warned Ranger, but being lifted off his feet by something other than a plane of helo was not something he was used to.

Their flight put them above the fog, Ranger’s vision reverted to normal vision. There was enough light to follow what was happening. And the SUVs they chased had headlights on and drove in formation, they would be easy to chase. Their flight also covered ground faster while travelling the crow flew. Ranger could run fast, but that wasn’t close to the Tempest Express.

The storm Tempest had running to carry them battered the ground below, pallets and crates flew, goods were scattered, guns slid across the ground as their crates were busted open. It was like a small hurricane had hit Red Hook. The damage it wrought was worth it as they closed on the SUVs

Hoving some eighty feet above the SUVs as they drove, Ranger made a snap decision. They needed to stop the SUVs to end the chase. The gang needed to be stopped, but they needed to not trash Red Hook with a hurricane to do it.

”Drop me on my mark! Hold altitude!!” Ranger called out through the storm. ”Three.” Ranger watched the relative position to the SUVs, ”Two.” They just needed to get a little more of a lead, ”One.” There! The SUVs slowed to avoid a pothole. ”Mark!”

When Tempest released Ranger he pulled in his arms, pinning down his rifle to his body, and dropped. From eighty feet Ranger fell, he had a moment to mentally prepare himself before his feet impacted the hood of the lead SUV two seconds later.

Ranger impacted the hood with twenty-thousand foot-pounds of force. His power kicked in providing his bones with the strength they needed to not immediately snap. The SUVs nosedived and after a brief moment of digging into the asphalt flipped ass over teakettle. The next few moments were fuzzy to the Ranger. He stood up, the suv laying on its side forty feet away. The second SUV had impacted the first and spun out but was still drivable, the third had swung wide around. It was Tempest’s target.

Everything hurt. His clothes were worn from sliding and rolling over asphalt. He could see blood from where his skin had fared worse than the rest of himself. His rifle was trashed. He stumbled a few steps before finding his balance. Being launched from the flipping vehicle had rattled his head like a can of spray paint.

Ranger was not afraid.

The man took his work seriously, their mission seriously, and the goals of Haven seriously. He was clearly not afraid to fly up at Tempest’s swooping whim or to fall with dangerous repercussions. Someone that direct, forthright made for an honest – if tough – person. No wonder he and Noel had bounded.

Ranger told him to hold and to drop on his mark, and that’s what Tempest did. He pulled himself away and to the side as one SUV dove into the pavement. It flipped like a slinky with so much metal eventually sliding up and over and into itself. The second SUV’s loud crash into the first made Devon worry Ranger might need back up, but he was there on his feet.

The third had dodged the surprising traffic accident and continued on through the dark streets of Red Hook. Tempest pursued, the winds whipping him along to match the car’s speed. He marveled at the force Ranger had brought down on the lead and simultaneously trusted him now to finish what they’d started. If Ranger had wanted continued back up from Tempest, then Tempest knew he’d have asked for it.

Thunder boomed as a bolt of lightning split the sky and smashed into the street not far from the car. The driver swore at the damnable weather. What was happening? Another came down, hitting a fire hydrant that sent a spray of sparks and water into the air. Gun barrels hung eagerly from open windows, waiting for whomever had attacked the first car. Tempest glared from above as he flew on, steadying his breathing. He knew this area and up ahead, the warehouse thinned as the docks came into view.

Another bolt streaked the night with light but the drive thought himself clever, dodging it by pulling hard into the turn onto the pier’s parallel street. This was Tempest’s goal. With a sudden rush of practiced rage-fueled focus a gust of tornado force whipped down with Tempest riding upon it. Both spun down as the gust flung the car side over side and rolled right off the side of the street and into the water. Tempest hung closer to earth’s surface, the winds quieting to support him and stir the fog. Trash whipped away from the side of the drop as he hovered over the ocean.

Out from the sinking ship the rats came, clawing at the sky for help as they flailed in their expensive attire. What little good the leather and chains would do them now. It weighed them down as they tried to find the edge of the wall or the smart one that headed for the pier. The masked Tempest, clad in the darkness of the night and the blacks of his own Haven mission attire, flung his arms out.

Thunder bellowed as lightning flashed above. Winds whipped at the sea and waves rushed up into the rats’ gasping mouths. Devon knew this was dramatic but Tempest demanded a warning well-served. The gusts thrust them across the water. “Leave the city. Swim or fly if you dare, but return and die,” his computer modified voice echoed form the speakers built into his costume. Once they’d played violin to remind Agnes whom she was. Now they served another purpose.

“Leave!” Tempest shouted again from the shadowed fog as lightning flashed down into the harbor down to the sunken SUV. The screaming men, flung away by Tempest’s boreal attack, felt the spasm in their muscles but were too far away for death. No, Devon didn’t want them dead. He wanted them gone and with pained memory to warn others away.

Thunder echoed once more as he rocketed into the sky, the fog pushed in all directions by the violent rise. He had a teammate to pick up and a warehouse to destroy once their team was out. A flaming wreck would be their final warning.

Ranger walked toward the flipped SUV. Some of the occupants were drawling their way out of the vehicle. The driver had flopped onto the asphalt, his mistake was not wearing the brown pants. The last few moments had let loose something into his intergluteal cleft. He saw Ranger approaching and put his hands over his head. Another man limped around the vehicle and pointed a rifle at Ranger. Acting on instinct, Ranger took hold of his tomahawk and with a quick throw, buried it the man’s chest. He went down like a sack of potatoes.

That sight proved too much for the remaining men in the SUV. They surrendered, their bloody hands covering the back of their heads as they lay on the ground. Ranger scanned for the second SUV as he disarmed them. Unlike his weapons, these had survived the tumble.

As he ripped the stripped the slide off the last pistol he head an SUV start to move. It was the second, the one that had collided with the first. The collision had incapacitated the driver but the navigator had finally extracted the driver and had it moving again.

Ranger quickly moved back into the middle of the road. He could chase on foot, but injured he wasn’t sure he could keep up. Instead he pulled a manhole cover off the road and, with his power rising to the occasion, hurled it into the read wheel of the SUV disabling it.

”Two hostile victors disabled. At least one EKIA. Moving to assess the second victor.” Ranger informed Tempest.

The SUV had tried to keep moving with one wheel trashed. The attempt had sheared it completely off and left back right side of it dragging. Ranger drew a pistol from a drop leg holster as he approached. Three men piled out of the vehicle with guns drawn.

”Drop y’r weapons!” Ranger commanded, Drop ‘em now!” He continued to close on the men. His finger ready to squeeze on the trigger. He was relying on the fear he’d created to stop the men. They’d seen him drop from the sky and get back up before throwing a manhole cover with enough speed to embed itself in their vehicle.

Two men looked at each other and visibly wavered. The third raised his rifle. Ranger shot. Several rounds impacted the third man. His own ballistic vest saved his life, but it took the fight out of him. All three men dropped their weapons.

”All hostiles have been pacified.”